


Between

by orphan_account



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Gender Dysphoria, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Nonbinary Character, Nonbinary Doctor (Doctor Who)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-20
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:53:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22808935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Donna catches the Doctor inspecting himself in the mirror. He doesn't look happy with what he sees.
Relationships: Tenth Doctor & Donna Noble, Tenth Doctor/Donna Noble
Comments: 7
Kudos: 132





	Between

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah so it's not explicit or graphic or even outright stated but this has some pretty overt references to self harm. So yeah idk I guess this is a vent fic but also I find the Gallifreyan relationship with gender kind of fascinating so it's like 70% vent 30% aliens are really interesting.

Donna frequently catches the Doctor looking in the mirror.

He's so  _ vain.  _ Every other day just about, he's staring in the upright mirror in his room, playing with his hair, smoothing his side-burns, grinning and giving himself a cocky little wink. Sometimes he's straightening out his suit or trying out a new outfit or, once in a blue moon, unhappily pinching a little muffin top that may have appeared after too many nights at restaurants in a row, only to disappear again within the week. She always rolls her eyes when he gets too flirty with himself, but often, she just silently watches.

This time, when she starts to open the door to his room, he's almost completely undressed.

It's nothing she hasn't seen before. What started out as snuggling on the couch quickly turned into sneaking into each others beds in the middle of the night when some post-nightmare cuddles were in order, which eventually mutated into just having fairly regular sleepovers, which led to occasionally changing in front of each other. The Doctor standing in front of his mirror in just his boxers isn't a very strange sight to Donna, but what _ is  _ a little new to her is the intense frown with which he's staring at his reflection.

Donna quiets herself, staying firmly behind the door. She doesn't want to intrude- maybe he'll put his clothes back on in a moment and she can go ahead with her plan to drag him out of this TARDIS and back through the festival they're currently parked in. She watches as he tilts his chin up, running a finger along his jawline. He ends up scratching a bit at that fine layer of five o'clock shadow he can never seem to get rid of, and his mouth contorts into that sour grimace he gets when something's particularly perturbed him. He moves his hands, then, to his waist. Honestly, Donna sometimes forgets how skinny he can be. She can just make out his hip bones protruding slightly over the waistband of his pants as he places his hands on either of his hips. He strokes them upward toward his waist, pressing deeper and deeper into his sides as he moves upward. Donna isn't sure exactly what he's trying to accomplish- she can't imagine he's trying to look _ thinner,  _ unsure of where he'd have to go, but the thought creeps up on her. After all, some people are never convinced they're skinny enough.

The thought is banished almost entirely when he reaches his chest. The Doctor slips his hands under his surprisingly prominent pectorals and, after a moment's hesitation, lightly pushes them upward. Again, Donna doesn't immediately recognise what he's trying to do, squishing the muscle and what little fat there is together to make a slightly more plush appearance, but within a few seconds, this one registers.

Donna suddenly turns away from the door, flattening herself against the adjacent wall. She shouldn't have seen that. She simply stares ahead for a moment, trying to process the scene she's just witnessed. She knows she's already seen too much, but she finds herself drawing back to the door, eyeing the crack into the room.

The Doctor now has his face in his hands, dragging them up and down. When he lets go, Donna can see that his eyes have gone a bit red at the edges. He stares miserably into the mirror, and Donna is so tempted to go to him, wrap her arms around him and tell him it's all going to be alright and that she loves him no matter what. Finally, he turns away from the mirror, walking toward the bed- but at the last moment stops, lets out a frustrated growl, and rushes toward the dresser. He opens the top drawer, fumbling around for a few seconds, before slamming it shut. He then heads to the nightstand, but it takes until he reaches  _ underneath _ the platform for Donna to realise what he's looking for. She very nearly bolts in to put a stop to it, but by now the Doctor is already huffing a resigned sigh and finally dropping onto the bed, apparently giving up his search. Donna's heart swells with pride to see him resist his urge. She straightens herself up, finally letting herself in.

"Doctor, did you- oh!" She feigns surprise at seeing him stripped down to his undies and curled up on himself in bed. She opens his closet and pulls out a large burgundy jumper to give him. She sits down next to him, and once he's firmly be-jumpered, starts stroking a hand down his back in an effort to soothe him. "Guess we're not feeling up to the carousel?"

"Not seeing it in the near future, no." The Doctor sighs.

"That's alright," Donna says, then, "Any… particular reason this's come on?"

"Just feeling a bit under the weather." The Doctor deflects. Donna sighs. So she's going to have to squeeze it out of him with a pair of tweezers, then.

"Alright Doctor, how bout I go scare up something to eat, and come back in a little while, let you rest, yeah?" Donna moves to get up, but the Doctor clasps a hand around her wrist.

"Actually… I… if it's alright with you…" he says hesitantly, not looking up at her. "I think I might need you to stay."

"Of  _ course  _ it's alright," Donna says, sitting back down, already understanding his meaning. "And Doctor?"

He finally darts his eyes up to look at her, and Donna sees that they're glassy and pink with tears.

"I'm  _ so  _ proud of you for saying so," she says, giving him a warm smile, and as always, he returns it to the best of his ability.

She doesn't sleep well that night.

Even with the Doctor snuggled within her arms, she feels anxious. She thinks back to what she'd seen- the way he'd tried to force his hips to curve, the reproach at his chin and stubble… she doesn't know what other impression she can possibly glean from it other than…

A few weeks ago, he'd told her about regeneration. About changing every cell in your body until you were such a new person you couldn't recognise yourself. The conversation slowly delves into some other things that have become a common topic of discussion between them, of mood swings and impulses and not being able to think clearly, of feeling lots and lots of ugly things, sometimes things that aren't real, and then, of what they used to do on Gallifrey to regenerations that were too unlike their old selves,  _ especially  _ if they were deemed dangerous. Donna wonders, though,  _ just  _ how unlike yourself you can become in regeneration, and if the Doctor truly is as different as he thinks he is, then maybe there's something more he wasn't prepared for.

"Why're you squeezing me so tight?" She suddenly hears in her ear.

"Oh, god, sorry." She says bashfully, loosening her grip on the giggling Timelord.

"No, it's fine," he says, still grinning, "Nothings wrong though?"

Donna purses her lips. She isn't sure where to even begin. This topic feels unapproachable, too tremendous for her to chip away at. She hasn't even really thought about how _ she  _ feels about it, if it is what she thinks it is, and she's a little afraid she'll be asked, but honestly it couldn't be more irrelevant. All Donna is concerned with right now is what's going on with the Doctor, and how she can help him feel better. Whatever the cause, no one deserves to feel so unhappy in their own skin as he'd looked today.

"Can I.. ask you something?" She decides eventually. "Something a bit personal."

"Course you can, you know you can ask me anything Donna."

"And will you answer?"

_ "Well,"  _ the Doctor looks up thoughtfully. Donna gives him a whack on the shoulder. He smirks. "Let's hear it."

"... When you told me all that stuff about… regeneration," she starts, and the Doctor's smile already disappears. "We talked a lot about.. how you felt about your  _ mind.  _ About how you're different as a  _ person..  _ and how you feel about it."

"Right. Well," the Doctor says awkwardly, swallowing a lump in his throat, "It felt sort of relevant."

"What you didn't talk about…" Donna continues, "is your body."

The Doctor freezes. Donna sees his eyebrows raise almost imperceptibly, and his mouth widen. So the question might be hitting a little close to home.

"You said your face changes too, right? How much?"

"Enough that you wouldn't recognise me," the Doctor answers. "Hair, eyes, nose, everything. It all goes.

"Build? Weight?" Donna asks.

"They can change."

"... Sex?" She asks carefully. The Doctor darts his eyes away.

"Can do. Never have." He says tersely.

"Do you like your body?"

His smile returns, brighter than ever. "Oh, one of my best faces, I think! _ "  _ He  _ winks,  _ clicking his  _ tongue. "Rakishly  _ handsome!"

"That's not what I asked." Donna says. The Doctor falters.

"Oh, I…  _ live  _ in it." He answers dismissively, "hard to have strong feelings either way about a body you know you'll be done with eventually."

"That's not true," Donna says, "You said you could spend a whole lifetime in one face. It's like a house- just cos you might move eventually doesn't mean the one you grow up in isn't important."

The Doctor frowns, his brows narrowing. For a moment, she thinks he might get upset with her, but suddenly he flips over onto his other side.

"Is that all?" He asks, faking a loud yawn. "Honestly, I've never had a companion so curious about Timelord idiosyncrasies, but it's getting a bit late to be debating the philosophical implications of reincarnation. Think I'm nodding off a bit…"

Donna sighs, but lets him pretend to be asleep. He surely won't want to come out with it if he feels assaulted. She closes her eyes and tries to forget about it long enough to fall asleep.

When she wakes up, the Doctor is already gone, no doubt to tinker with whatever project is currently consuming his attention or get some breakfast, or maybe even to actually walk around the fair a bit. She takes the opportunity to rummage around his room, trying to find what the Doctor had been searching so frantically for yesterday before  _ he _ does. It ends up being taped to the inside of one of his unread novels, and on the way she finds a very guilt-trippy note tucked behind the closet door about  _ trust  _ and _ privacy  _ and  _ honesty _ , which Donna has to admit would've made her feel very bad if she hadn't already known what she would find. She disposes of both, and puts a much more superior, high-and-mighty note in the book, hoping to god that if he ever finds it, it's because he decided to read the fucking book.

They spend the day out in the fair, marvelling at attractions, trying new foods, and picking out souvenirs. By the end of the day they're stumbling back into the TARDIS giddy and exhausted and a little tipsy, and they open a bottle of something they'd bought and sit on the kitchen floor to drink the night away. They're laughing about some hack fortune teller they'd met at the fair, when Donna says, "Make a guess about me."

The Doctor smiles mischievously. "What, to see if I'm any more accurate than she was?"

"Course, dumbo!" Donna giggles.

"Alright then," the Doctor purses his lips, "I'll bet you were a little trouble maker in school."

"Oh, that's hardly a guess." Donna rolls her eyes, "Course I was, what else'd you expect?"

"Oh, you can do better then!" The Doctor cries, "a'right then, have a guess! Tell me something new about myself."

Donna purses her lips thoughtfully, then says, "I bet, you think you're _ really handsome." _

"Oh, that's original," says the Doctor, "oh, right, the Doctor's a narcissist, what a groundbreaking epiphany, what a, a, a radical-"

"But you don't _ want _ to be handsome, do you?"

The Doctor's smile falls away, and Donna feels her heart seize up with terror that she's gone too far. He grimaces slightly, letting his head fall back against the cabinet behind him.

"Well. You've really sussed me out, haven't you?" He bites out. "Clever Donna always two steps ahead of me, you are! Always sniffing out clues, always making connections… I can't hide _ anything _ from you."

Donna purses her lips, gaze falling to the floor for a moment, but she pushes forward.

"Go on then," she says, giving him a gentle kick against his leg. He sighs, seemingly having gotten his little tantrum out.

After a pause, the Doctor swallows, and his voice comes back to him.

"On Gallifrey," he says hoarsely, "It's completely ordinary, to change when you regenerate. Our bodies and minds are _ always  _ changing, so why shouldn't our genders? Buuuuuuut…." The Doctor trails off, turning his face toward the wall. "Timelords, I guess you could say we're sort of…  _ completionists,  _ you know? If I really think about it, it's probably more to do with _ control _ than anything else… usually, when a Timelord changes gender, they _ make  _ the decision _ before  _ they regenerate. And then they change, so that their body matches their mind."

He sighs, and drags his hands down his face.

"So why do I feel like this?"

Donna bites her lip.

"Do you… feel like.. you want to be a-"

"I don't know, Donna," the Doctor says, "it's different all the time. Some days I… don't feel it at all, sometimes I'm perfectly  _ happy  _ with.. the way I look. My body. Being a bloke. Most of the time its just, a sort of.. Nag, at the back of my mind. I only wish it were a _ little  _ different. My chin could be smaller. My waist could be trimmer. My cheeks could be softer. But…" he grits his teeth, "some days I'd change... _ everything." _

They sit in silence for a moment while his words sink in.

"So, you…" Donna starts, then, " _ don't  _ think you'd be happier.. being a woman?"

"No," the Doctor says glumly, shaking his head, " _ No,  _ I.. I dunno  _ maybe _ , but there'd still be those days where I'd think  _ god, I wish I were a man!"  _ He grimaces bashfully, "I… guess.. I need to be somewhere in between?" He smushes a hand over his eyes. "I dunno, it's confusing, and stupid, and, and  _ pointless-" _

"What?" Donna cries incredulously, "no it's not, stop saying that!" She gives him a whack on the arm, "it's not stupid,  _ especially  _ if it's causing you so much pain! And anyway, that doesn't even make sense!" Donna insists, "why on earth would a Timelord decide to change genders in their next regeneration, if they weren't already feeling like they wanted to be that gender in the first place?"

The Doctor looks like he's going to argue with her for a moment, before looking away, furrowing his brow.

"Huh."

"Yeah,  _ huh!"  _ Donna agrees, "Don't let your weird stuffy Timelord upbringing make you feel ashamed of having dysphoria, when all those other Timelords you knew before who changed gender probably had the exact same problem and just lied about it!"

The Doctor seems to consider this for a moment, then gives a weak smirk.

"Maybe I should do what they did and just make myself  _ regenerate  _ to look how I want!"

Donna gives a small, forced chuckle, but it instantly fills her with such sorrow that she wishes she could swallow it back up. She catches the Doctors eye, and says, "please don't joke like that."

The Doctor actually looks surprised at that. "Right. No, course not. I'm.. sorry."

Donna places a comforting hand on the Doctors knee, rubbing it back and forth, but pauses when something occurs to her.

"Hang on," she says, "You know, you're not the most masculine bloke out there."

"Oh, thanks."

"No, I mean, maybe you're right, maybe your whole.. Gender… situation _ is  _ supposed to change all at once, but maybe yours _ did, _ I mean, look at you, you tiny thing! With your big eyes and your… swishy… mannerisms, maybe for someone whose feelings change day to day-"

"This is the best thing the regeneration process could cook up?"

Donna can't help but cringe a little, despite trying to hold it back. After a moment, she finds her words again.

"I know this probably doesn't mean much," she says, "but I think you'd be really pretty."

The Doctor stares at her for a long moment, and Donna is about to wonder if she's said something wrong again, when he speaks up.

"Maybe it's stupid," he says, "but that means a lot, actually."

"Look, I don't know how all this stuff works for Timelords-"

"I think I've made it _ pretty  _ clear that I don't either-"

"But if you need help figuring out what the next step is," Donna says, cosying up to the Doctor's side, "I'll do anything I can to give you a hand sorting things out, or even just listen. And you  _ know  _ whatever you decide, I will be behind you every step of the way."

The Doctor stays still, simply staring ahead, then says,

"I never even would have brought this up if you hadn't made me. I would've brought it to my grave-  _ well,  _ my regeneration."

"I know," says Donna, "but I couldn't let that happen."

The Doctor clears his throat.

"Thank you, Donna." He says, through a slightly wet voice, then places a kiss to the top of her head. "Really, thank you _ so much." _


End file.
